Arcade, 1993. Developed and published by Midway Manufacturing company.

May not be suitable for players under 17 years of age. Parental Discretion Advised.

Mortal Kombat II is my all-time favorite 2-D fighting game. I like it better than any of Capcom's mostly excellent fighters. I like it better than any SNK offerings, although to be honest I don't have a very high opinion of SNK fighting games to begin with. MKII even edges out my other favorite 2-D fighters, Guilty Gear and BlazBlue. There is no game that I ever played so passionately in the arcades. I was a Mortal Kombat champion when I was a teenager. Even after I got the SNES version of MKII, every quarter I could get went into a MKII machine.

Mortal Kombat is the red-headed stepchild of the fighting game world, even though it's been one of the most successful fighting franchises and is still hugely popular. It's the only real success Western developers have had in the otherwise Japanese-dominated fighting game genre. In a sea of me-too Street Fighter imitators, Mortal Kombat stood out with its unique fighting engine, its detailed art style, a mix of digitized actors and hand-drawn artwork from designers like John Tobias and Tony Goskie, and of course, its over-the-top blood and gore, which ruffled the feathers of quite a few Congressmen and their constituents.

Mortal Kombat II is generally seen as the best in the series, and with good reason. It had some of the highest production values of its time, with careful attention being paid to every detail. The digitized scans of the actors were far cleaner and sharper than previous efforts like Pit-Fighter and MKI, thanks to Midway's use of the latest technology as well as meticulous editing and coloring on the part of the designers.

MKII's fighting engine is also heavily criticized by hardcore Capcom/SNK nuts, although it too represents Ed Boon's desire to differentiate his game from the Japanese games. Personally, I enjoy the MK fighting engine. It relies on special moves a lot more than Street Fighter does, but Mortal Kombat's signature move is also one of its simplest - the uppercut, which provides a devastating finish to any combo. Unlike Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat's system does not revolve around running up a "hit" counter. It emphasizes juggling and midair fighting a lot more.

Mortal Kombat II was a fairly balanced fighter. True, it had one very underpowered character and one very overpowered character. Reptile was the Dan of MKII, a character with a lot of cool-looking but ineffective moves, while Mileena was MKII's overpowered Akuma. Between these two extremes, there was something for everyone. Liu Kang and Johnny Cage were designed to be easy-to-use balanced fighters, like Ryu and Ken. Jax is a fierce grappler. Perennial fan-favorites Scorpion and Sub-Zero were designed for people who like to set traps for their opponents. Baraka didn't have a lot of special moves other than his slicing blades to counter jump-kickers, but he had a long reach.

My personal favorite - and indeed, possibly my favorite character in any fighting game, is Kitana, a female ninja armed with a deadly fan made of razor blades - now there's a fan-fighter, not that "me bouncy!" lady. She had the coolest projectile attack - her fan is the strongest projectile, it drips blood when it hits, it can be thrown midair, and it can be utilized in some devastating combos. There was nothing cooler than demolishing an opponent with Kitana's Fan Lift/Jump Kick/Midair Fan Throw/Uppercut combo.

One of the things that made Mortal Kombat II so memorable was its personality. In MKII, the Fatalities weren't as generic as the ones in MKI and were designed to fit the personality of the character doing them - Baraka could impale his enemy on his knives, Kitana and Mileena each had a "Kiss of Death" - Mileena's Kiss of Death also showed her true origins. Liu Kang had a fairly spectacular Fatality where he morphed into a dragon - in those days, "morphing" was still a cool gimmick.

Personality in MKII involved more than just gruesomely killing your enemies. The game had a lot of humor to it. Under certain conditions, you could perform "Friendship" and "Babality" (turn your opponent into a baby) finishing moves. And one of the most memorable jokes in the game was the head of MK composer Dan "Toasty!" Forden popping up at random when you hit an opponent with an uppercut. Midway's games were unabashedly cheesy, and they were proud of it.

When I got my PS3, I downloaded Mortal Kombat II right away. Playing online has brought back a lot of good memories of endless MKII tournaments, and I must confess I've probably played MKII on my PS3 more than any other game. It's a testament to the game's enduring popularity that you can easily find a match at any time, day or night.

Mortal Kombat II was, at the time, the closest an American-made video game had gotten to the kind of rabid fandom of games like Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy. At arcades, people would be crowded around MKII machines while the rest of the arcade was empty. I even went to see the first Mortal Kombat movie in theaters with my dad.

Moreover, it was also an important turning point for the industry. Because of the outcry over violence in video games from parents' groups and Congress, Nintendo of America rigidly censored any overtly violent, sexual, or religious content in SNES games in the interest of being family-friendly. Sega was somewhat more liberal in its approach to controversial content, as it had its own ratings system. Nintendo got a rude awakening when the blood-free SNES version of Mortal Kombat I was outsold by the graphically weaker, relatively uncensored Genesis version by a factor of four to one. Mortal Kombat was one of the biggest third-party franchises out there, and Nintendo lost out on it. So Nintendo allowed Mortal Kombat II to be released completely uncensored for the SNES with a parental warning on the box - Mortal Kombat II was released only days before the first games bearing the newly-created ESRB ratings. Over time, Nintendo relaxed its guidelines on other previously banned content on its systems and even released a few M-rated games itself.

Anyway, I guess the whole point of this long-winded essay is this: Best. 2-D fighting game. Ever.

Thanks for reading, and stay tuned for my next game, which is also a "MK" game!

Like what you see? Let's see a show of thumbs!

P.S. I dedicate this blog to one of 1UP.com's greatest citizens, Alice B.

MK.

I never really got into the Mortal Kombat games, though I wish I were good enough at them to pull off the "Friendship" moves. Believe it or not, I actually did like the MK movie, though. My favorite characters are Reptile and Sonya Blade, but only because they both wear green and that's my favorite color. And that's everything I know about MK games. --Cary

MK2

To me Mortal Kombat 2 was the height of the series. It was the right amount of both "epic' and "cheese" before other MK games veered too much in either direction. Still love the moaning trees with faces and you can't knock the game that introduced Kitana and made Reptile playable!

Block button...

at the time, I had no idea why block deserved a button...but i got really used to it and enjoyed it. for many MK2 is pretty much the height of the series and nothing else made a larger dent in the fighting world. I agree with you. to paly tournaments with friends or new acquaintences is a fun time indeed. I still think this is the SNES best side by side port against Genesis. I recall playing til my hands hand their our form of headaches. good one!

Now the kombat kontinues....

Redertainment: I don't know if I'd want benefits from most of these people.

yariX: I liked the fighting system. It took a different approach from everything else. Arc System Works was the only other 2-D fighting game maker whose games didn't come off as low-budget Street Fighter. Plus, I think too many 2-D games these days rely on "hit porn."

Cary: I don't remember what you had do to do do Friendships (I think win without blocking), and you'd probably like the Babality move.

BrokenH: Mortal Kombat actually had something of a renaissance with Deadly Alliance and Deception on PS2. The franchise was damaged by the less-than-spectacular PS1/N64 era games like MK3 and MK4, and terrible spin-offs like MK Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Special forces. The face in the trees was actually that of MK co-creator Ed Boon, which kind of went along with John Romero's severed head inside the head of the final Doom II boss.

Hydro: I always felt that arcade fighting games skirted the gambling line a little bit. Sure, you don't get paid cash, but you still get free games off of other people. Not that I'm complaining, mind.

micronaut: The Block button was another criticism hardcore Street Fighter fans had. But Virtua Fighter and Soulcalibur also have block buttons.

MajinLink: I still love playing MKII online and in tournaments, and it does require a lot more skill than people tend to give it credit for.

Hmm.

I know Mortal Kombat was pretty much the peak of the series before it started getting all crazy, but I actually liked Trilogies. Why, I'm not sure. Maybe it was because of the extensive character list and it was just...crazy, to me.

Is that your best?

Sorrowful: One of the big things people didn't like about MK3 was all the characters that got dropped, including favorites like Scorpion and Kitana in favor of... Stryker? UMK3 and Trilogy did address those complaints with a comprehensive roster including all the characters people had wanted to begin with. The graphical and audio quality of MK3 also seemed somewhat degraded from MKII.

Only a couple so far, huh?

I remember when you mentioned this and thought you would be further in your picks. Its nice I don't have too much catching up to do. That though can depend how fast you blog, I won't have complete internet access until the end of the month. AT&T has a lot of work to do to provide me internet and home phone service. It really sucks. I am at a cafe right now printing some forms. I though I would make a quick round at some of you 1uppers and let you know I haven't forgot about you guys and gals!

Finish Him!

Xcite: Yeah, I'm a slow blogger. I don't know how some of these people do it. I'm trying to up my output but there'll be plenty for you to enjoy. Hope you get your cable/internet serivce sorted out. Good to see you.

Marko_Fuego: I liked UMK3, especially since it brought back a lot of my favorite characters that got cut from MK3 like Kitana and Ninja Scorpion.

I Gave It A Try Recently

And, I'm only guessing this, but I suck hard. But back a few years ago when I had my Genesis and N64, I got more than a fair bit of fun out of the earlier MK games, especially MKII. Since I was so young then it was that much cooler seeing all the gore. To this day I still like the first MK movie; I got no idea what the hell happened w/ the 2nd one.

I hope the new MK game can bring the series back to people's attention, 'cuz the more quality fighters around the better. It'll have to go up w/ the likes of Capcom and SNK's new offerings (no SNK love? Really?!?), but if they do it right they're gonna have some big success.

I think one of my favorite characters back then used to be Johnny Cage, mostly b/c he sort of had the same name as mine; yep, being a kid lets you make impartial decisions like that.

I'm stoked...

...about the new Mortal Kombat myself. It's amazing the Mortal Kombat team has survived all these years and through a bankruptcy no less. They're now called Netherrealm Studios.

Really, I wish we could get more 3-D fighting games, especially from Namco and Sega. Square also used to make great 3-D fighters on the PS1, and I'd love to see a revival of Tobal or Bushido Blade. I own almost every fighting game Namco and Square made for PS1, and I've thought about collecting all of Sega's 3-D Saturn fighting games.

Hornbuckle who?

yariX: I sometimes found it hard to swallow a single uppercut scoring six hits on an opponent. BlazBlue and Guilty Gear are meant to be more over-the-top, but the combo porn thing is in almost every 2-D fighting game out there. I'm thinking of getting Continuum Shift for PS3, and if I do, hit me up for a game.

Widow: Pick up MK vs. DC Universe and I'll play you a couple rounds on Live.

I LOVED this game.

On that Street Fighter vs Tekken article, I wrote that they should have done a Street Fighter vs Mortal Kombat! It'd print money I tell you! Yeah, I played at the arcades a lot too. My proudest moment was Jax's arm rip off and Shang Tsung transforming into Kintaro and pushing the torso off of some sucker! And I watched the movie in theaters 3 times...once alone, 2nd with my brother, 3rd with my brother and his friend.

You are the supreme Mortal Kombat warrior!

Rob: I'd be all for a MK vs. SF. That was the big dream match-up when those two games were kings at the arcade. The movie wasn't bad, and the scene where Johnny Cage does his split punch on Goro was classic.